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Dessert

Sponge Pudding or Souffle

A light, airy pudding made with sugar, flour, milk, butter, egg yolks, and egg whites, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Sponge Pudding or Souffle

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the custard

  1. Mix sugar and flour in a bowl.

  2. Wet the mixture with a little cold milk and stir into the boiling milk.

  3. Cook until thickened and smooth.

  4. Add the butter and mix well.

  5. Stir the mixture into the beaten egg yolks.

Bake and serve

  1. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  2. Bake in cups, a shallow dish, or paper cases in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

  3. Place the dish in a pan of hot water while baking.

  4. Serve with cream sauce.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped into the batter to trap air, giving the pudding its light, risen sponge texture.
Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help set the pudding with a tender, rich texture.
Flour
Thickens the milk mixture into a smooth base that holds the pudding's structure.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, adding moisture and softness.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a soft, tender crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and adds flavour to the custard base.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Egg whites hold air only when whipped and folded gently; stirring hard deflates the foam, so the sponge bakes up dense rather than light.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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